Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama Part 143

Like ... men of wit bereaven, Which howle and shoote against the lights of heaven.

Wm. Browne, Britannia's Pastorals, iv. (1613).

=Scogan= (_Henry_), M.A., a poet, contemporary with Chaucer. He lived in the reigns of Richard II., Henry IV., and probably Henry V. Among the gentry who had letters of protection to attend Richard II. in his expedition into Ireland, in 1399, is "Henricus Scogan, Armiger."--Tyrwhitt's _Chaucer_, v. 15 (1773).

Scogan? What was he?

Oh, a fine gentleman and a master of arts Of Henry the Fourth's time, that made disguises For the king's sons, and writ in ballad royal Daintily well.

Ben Jonson, _The Fortunate Isles_ (1626).

_Scogan_ (_John_), the favorite jester and buffoon of Edward IV.

"Scogan's jests" were published by Andrew Borde, a physician in the reign of Henry VIII.

The same Sir John [_Falstaff_], the very same. I saw him break Skogan's head at the court-gate, when he was a crack not thus high.--Shakespeare, 2 _Henry IV._ act iii. sc. 2.

? Shakespeare has confounded Henry Scogan, M.A., the poet, who lived in the reign of Henry IV., with John Scogan, the jester, who lived about a century later, in the reign of Edward IV.; and, of course, Sir John Falstaff, could not have known him when "he was a mere crack."

=Scogan's Jest.= Scogan and some companions, being in lack of money, agreed to the following trick: A peasant, driving sheep, was accosted by one of the accomplices, who laid a wager that his sheep were hogs, and agreed to abide by the decision of the first person they met. This, of course, was Scogan, who instantly gave judgment against the herdsman.

A similar joke is related in the _Hitopadesa_, an abridged version of Pilpay's _Fables_. In this case, the "peasant" is represented by a Brahmin carrying a goat, and the joke was to persuade the Brahmin that he was carrying a dog. "How is this, friend," says one, "that you, a Brahmin, carry on your back such an unclean animal as a dog?" "It is not a dog," says the Brahmin, "but a goat;" and trudged on. Presently another made the same remark, and the Brahmin, beginning to doubt, took down the goat to look at it. Convinced that the creature was really a goat, he went on, when presently a third made the same remark. The Brahmin, now fully persuaded that his eyes were befooling him, threw down the goat and went away without it; whereupon the three companions took possession of it and cooked it.

In _Tyll Eulenspiegel_ we have a similar hoax. Eulenspiegel sees a man with a piece of green cloth, which he resolves to obtain. He employs two confederates, both priests. Says Eulenspiegel to the man, "What a famous piece of blue cloth! Where did you get it?" "Blue, you fool! why, it is green." After a short contention, a bet is made, and the question in dispute is referred to the first comer. This was a confederate, and he at once decided that the cloth was blue. "You are both in the same boat," says the man, "which I will prove by the priest yonder." The question being put to the priest, is decided against the man, and the three rogues divide the cloth amongst them.

Another version is in novel 8 of Fortini. The joke was that certain kids he had for sale were capons.--See Dunlop, _History of Fiction_, viii.

art. "Ser Giovanni."

=Scone= [_Skoon_], a palladium stone. It was erected in Icolmkil for the coronation of Fergus Eric, and was called the _Lia-Fail_ of Ireland.

Fergus, the son of Fergus Eric, who led the Dalriads to Argyllshire, removed it to Scone; and Edward I. took it to London. It still remains in Westminster Abbey, where it forms the support of Edward the Confessor's chair, which forms the coronation chair of the British monarchs.

Ni fallat fatum, Scoti, quocunque locatum Invenient lapidem, regnare tenentur ibidem.

Lardner, _History of Scotland_, i. 67 (1832).

Where'er this stone is placed, the fates decree, The Scottish race shall there the sovereigns be.

? Of course, the "Scottish race" is the dynasty of the Stuarts and their successors.

=Scotch Guards=, in the service of the French kings, were called his _garde du corps_. The origin of the guard was this: When St. Louis entered upon his first crusade, he was twice saved from death by the valor of a small band of Scotch auxiliaries under the commands of the earls of March and Dunbar, Walter Stuart, and Sir David Lindsay. In grat.i.tude thereof, it was resolved that "a standing guard of Scotchmen, recommended by the king of Scotland, should ever more form the body-guard of the king of France." This decree remained in force for five centuries.--Grant, _The Scottish Cavalier_, xx.

=Scotland.= So called, according to legend, from Scota, daughter of Pharaoh. What gives this legend especial interest is, that when Edward I. laid claim to the country as a fief of England, he pleaded that Brute, the British king, in the days of Eli and Samuel, had conquered it. The Scotch, in their defence, pleaded their independence in virtue of descent from Scota, daughter of Pharaoh. This is not fable, but sober history.--Rymer, _Fdera_, I. ii. (1703).

=Scotland a Fief of England.= When Edward I. laid claim to Scotland as a fief of the English crown, his great plea was that it was awarded to Adelstan, by direct miracle, and, therefore, could never be alienated.

His advocates seriously read from _The Life and Miracles of St. John of Beverley_, this extract: Adelstan went to drive back the Scotch, who had crossed the border, and, on reaching the Tyne, St. John of Beverley appeared to him, and bade him cross the river at daybreak. Adelstan obeyed, and reduced the whole kingdom to submission. On reaching Dunbar, in the return march, Adelstan prayed that some sign might be given, to testify to all ages that G.o.d had delivered the kingdom into his hands.

Whereupon he was commanded to strike the basaltic rock with his sword.

This did he, and the blade sank into the rock "as if it had been b.u.t.ter," cleaving it asunder for "an ell or more." As the cleft remains to the present hour, in testimony of this miracle, why, of course, _cela va sans dire_.--Rymer, _Fdera_, I. ii. 771 (1703).

=Scotland's Scourge=, Edward I. His son, Edward II., buried him in Westminster Abbey, where his tomb is still to be seen, with the following inscription:--

Edwardus Longus, Scotorum Malleus, hic est.

(Our Longshanks, "Scotland's Scourge," lies here).

Drayton, _Polyolbion_, xvii. (1613).

So Longshanks, Scotland's Scourge, the land laid waste.

Ditto, xxix. (1622).

=Scots= (_scuite_, "a wanderer, a rover"), the inhabitants of the western coast of Scotland. As this part is very hilly and barren, it is unfit for tillage; and the inhabitants used to live a roving life on the produce of the chase, their chief employment being the rearing of cattle.

_Scots_ (_The Royal_). The hundred cuira.s.siers, called _hommes des armes_, which formed the body-guard of the French king, were sent to Scotland in 1633, by Louis XIII., to attend the coronation of Charles I., at Edinburgh. On the outbreak of the civil war, eight years afterwards, these cuira.s.siers loyally adhered to the crown, and received the t.i.tle of "The Royal Scots." At the downfall of the king, the _hommes des armes_ returned to France.

=Scott= (_The Southern_). Ariosto is so called by Lord Byron.

First rose The Tuscan father's "comedy divine" [_Dante_]; Then, not unequal to the Florentine, The southern Scott, the minstrel who called forth A new creation with his magic line, And, like the Ariosto of the north [_Sir W. Scott_], Sang ladye-love and war, romance and knightly worth.

Byron, _Childe Harold_, iv. 40 (1817).

? Dante was born at Florence.

=Scott of Belgium= (_The Walter_), Hendrick Conscience (1812- ).

=Scottish Anacreon= (_The_), Alexander Scot is so called by Pinkerton.

=Scottish Boanerges= (_The_), Robert and James Haldane (nineteenth century). Robert died 1842, aged 79, and James 1851.

=Scottish Hogarth= (_The_), David Allan (1744-1796).

=Scottish Homer= (_The_), William Wilkie, author of an epic poem in rhyme, ent.i.tled _The Epigoniad_ (1753).

=Scottish Solomon= (_The_), James VI. of Scotland, subsequently called James I. of England (1566, 1603-1625).

? The French king called him far more aptly, "The Wisest Fool in Christendom."